Art Department Coordinator
Summary
Organize schedules, budgets, and staff for a film set's art department.
What does an Art Department Coordinator do?
The Art Department Coordinator is the Administrator for the art department on a film set.
To understand what this entails, here’s a bit of background about a film set: the Art Department is the largest department on set and consists of all the fields responsible for creating the visual design of the movie (set design, props, costumes etc.). As the Art Department Coordinator, you make sure that information flows smoothly between all these fields, monitor the budget for the department, and generally keep everything here in order.
In addition to these administrative duties you serve as a liaison between the art department and the production department (which consists of the Film Director, Film Producer, Camera Operators, and other people who actually make the movie). The Art Department Coordinator reports to the head of each department and makes sure everyone is on the same page with shared issues like budgets and schedules.
This all adds up to you being responsible for the logistics and operation of the art department. Every day will be jam packed, and could involve anything from making sure the Lighting technicians are following safety regulations, to figuring out how to ship props and crew to the filming location, to arguing for an increase in the drapery budget allotment. To survive this hectic schedule you need incredible organization and people management skills.
